Violence

Republican lawmakers and conservative media critics pressed President Trump to explore new restrictions on the videogame industry, arguing that violent games might have contributed to mass shootings like the attack at a Parkland, Fl., high school. The industry says studies have shown no connection between videogames and violence.

It’s an old controversy: do video games encourage violence in real life? After reports that the Florida school shooter spent as many as 15 hours daily playing violent video games, President Trump calls a White House meeting on the issue.

The city signs on to controversial gun-violence reduction program called Advance Peace, which critics say pays violent criminals not to shoot guns. Participants can receive $9,000 stipends during an 18-month period for reaching goals such as successfully completing substance abuse treatment or completing education.

Violent crime in Chicago this year has fallen only slightly since last year, when 780 people were killed in Chicago — the most the city has seen in any year since the mid-1990s, found a Chicago Sun-Times analysis.

The newly released 10-year plan takes a public health approach, looking at causes of violence and modeling strategies used in other cities. It aims to curb gun violence, promote restorative justice, support children and families, and bolster coordination of violence prevention efforts.

Brazil’s economic downturn has spurred a spike in violence, prompting reconsideration of whether it is safe for tourists to visit Rio’s favelas. Although beset with drugs and crime, the slums attract international visitors seeking a close look at authentic local culture.

Slightly over half of U.S. violent victimizations between 2012 and 2015 involved people of the same race, or both were Hispanic, says the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics. Among black victims, 11 percent of violent incidents were committed by whites; among whites, 15 percent were committed by blacks.

ByVictoria McKenzie |October 3, 2017

Alaska has the highest rate of femicide by men, followed by Nevada, Louisiana, and Tennessee, according to the annual report of the Violence Policy Center (VPI). Black women are more than twice as likely to be killed by men than their white counterparts.

Minneapolis Mayor Betsy Hodges hosted a national conference on combating youth violence and fielded questions about a recent spate of shootings in her own downtown entertainment district. “It’s wrong, it’s bad, it should not happen in our city,” she said. “It did happen in our city. And we are doing everything we can to find whatever strategies we can to end that violence.”

The 21st Century Cures Act provided $500 million to deal with the opioid crisis but three-quarters of it remains unspent. The law's two-year spending span makes it difficult for treatment providers to build long-term programs. "This is a total failure," says one expert.

Opponents of gun control argue that better attention to mentally troubled individuals will do more to prevent mass shootings than restricting access to firearms to the general population. But our columnist argues that there is little evidence supporting mental illness as a critical factor in acts of tragic violence.

Ty Cobb, an attorney for President Trump, says he is not considering the firing of special counsel Robert Mueller. Cobb issued a statement after another Trump lawyer, John Dowd, seemed to be laying the groundwork for dismissing Mueller. Dowd called the special counsel's probe "corrupted" by political bias.

Former FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe was dismissed by Attorney General Jeff Sessions hours before his retirement, likely costing him pension benefits. McCabe says the firing is part of an effort to slander him and to "taint the FBI, law enforcement, and intelligence professionals more generally."